2 years and almost 5 months

Where does time fly? I cannot believe it that Alina's almost 2 1/2. My brother had a baby recently and I started to reminisce  about the times when Alina was little. We had a really hard time but looking at her now, I don't regret any of it. Alina's now a healthy and very active toddler. Her favourite things are running, dancing- non stop from morning till just before bedtime, singing- including inventing her own song- and bossing us around and eating sweeties. The first thing she tells Alex when he walks through the door in the evening is " Daddy dance! or "Sweeties". She's got an incredible memory. If you tell her something she'll catch you out by reminding you about it later. We have to be very careful what we promise her :0).
She also likes to organise races and I love her little face when she runs towards me and says "Alina is the winner!" Of course, the most fun is to say " Daddy/Mommy is the loser" :0).
I still cannot believe it that a toddler with pretty much one lung has so much energy. She will be very athletic, that's for sure. I have signed her up with a football (soccer) class. She loves kicking or throwing a ball, so I am sure she'll enjoy it. We also went swimming the other day. We hadn't been in a while because I was always worried about her catching chest infections.With the weather being so warm, we had a trip to the pool which she thoroughly enjoyed. She was a bit weary of deeper water at first but after a while, there was no stopping her.
Over Easter we went to Romania to visit my parents. Alina can understand everything in Romanian but isn't very keen on speaking it. I am not pushing her, she'll decide when it's the right time to start. The funny thing was that in Romania a few kids told her that they too wanted to learn how to speak English.
Alina was very popular in Romania. I think because she's a very carefree child; she runs around everywhere, loves to invent new games and for her everything is a laugh. She's got a great sense of humour.  We were having lunch outside and I got myself an ice cream on a stick. I left part of the wrapper on. She said" Take it out" I replied, "No". Alina said again: "Take it out". I replied again "No". Then she gave me a big grin and with a mischevious look on her face she said " Leave it in". I started laughing.
When we were in Romania, Alex left a few days before us and on the plane I asked her" Do you miss daddy?" She gave me a puzzled look and said "We miss the train mummy!" What do I know, right!? :0)

A hug, Konstantin and Maximilian